Pre-heat oven to 170C (convention)/150C (fan-forced/convection). Line a rimmed bakjng sheet with baking paper.
Place tahini in a small heavy bottomed saucepan on medium heat. Add maple syrup and coconut sugar. Cook for a minute, stirring until smooth and warmed through. Remove from heat.
Place almond meal, salt, vanilla, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice in a medium bowl. Mix gently. Add the tahini mixture and mix with a wooden spoon until just combined.
Using your hands, knead into a stiff dough. Divide in two portions.
Cut two large squares of baking paper (30cm). Place a portion of the dough between the squares and gently roll to just less than a 1/4 inch thickness. Use a press and spread technique rather than rolling freely as the tahini dough is hard and requires a firm hand to roll.
Cut into desired shapes using cookie cutters. Place on a baking sheet lined with baking paper (about 1/2 inch apart). Repeat with the remaining dough portion.
Bake cookies in the pre-heated oven for approximately 13-14 minutes.
Remove from oven. Allow to cool completely on the trays. Ice with white icing or dust with icing sugar. Store in an air-tight container in a cool corner of your kitchen for up to two weeks.
Notes
I use a half runny tahini and half dense tahini. The dense tahini helps make the dough stiff and gives the gingerbread cookie a tough, biscuit-like quality. This makes it ideal for gingerbread house projects, making gingerbread buttons or other Christmas decorations and gift tags that need to be strung.If you like a softer, chewy cookie like my Vegan Tahini Cookies - use only runny tahini and bake for 10-11 minutes.The dough is stiff and oily (due to the tahini). The rolling of the dough should be more a pressing down action as opposed to rolling. Dough is also easy to pinch and patch if it cracks or tears.The cookies develop in flavour over 2-3 days and taste best after.The cookie dough is fine to be eaten raw and can be rolled into truffles and dipped in chocolate.